Divine Liturgy:

8:30 am & 10:30am Sunday

5:30 pm Monday through Friday

7:00 pm Holydays

Sacrament of Reconciliation

One half hour before Mass on

Sunday

Baptism: Contact the priest as soon

as the baby is born

Marriage: Contact the priest at

least six months prior to the

wedding

Sickness: Contact the priest if

someone is sick at home or in the

hospital or in a nursing home.

Pastor:

Fr. Elias Abi Sarkis

padre@saintherese.org

The Tulsa Maronite News,

published monthly by:

Saint Therese Catholic Church 8315 South 107th East Ave.

Tulsa, OK 74133 (Hwy 169 & East 81st St. South)

Office (918) 872-7400

info@saintherese.org

Fax(918) 286-6619

Hall & Kitchen (918) 461-9450

Emergency (678) 772-8708

Web: www.Saintherese.org

Volume 17, Issue 9

Tulsa Maronite News

December 2013

Our Mission Statement

To establish a permanent

Eastern Catholic presence

for Northeast Oklahoma by

sharing the Mysteries of

Jesus Christ as expressed

through the richness of the

Maronite tradition

Tulsa M aron ite News

Tulsa Maronite News

SAINT THERESE CATHOLIC CHURCH Maronite Rite

Dear Parishioners and Friends of St. Therese Church,

I hope you all had a lovely Thanksgiving with your families. This holiday

means a lot to me because it is not a commercial one. It is a day with the family

getting together to thank God for everything He bestows upon us. As you know,

Christmas is around the corner. I would like you to celebrate the spirituality of

the Birth of Our Lord, not the commercial event. Remember that Jesus was

born for a spiritual purpose and He needs our heart to be a gift. Make sure to

attend Divine Liturgy during this day of obligation and to ask Our Lord to cre-

ate in you a new person.

I would like to remind you that we are having our Christmas Luncheon on De-

cember 15th. I would ask you to support the fund raiser of the parish. Please

don’t forget to buy tickets, to invite your families and friends so we can cele-

brate together our Christmas Luncheon as a family.

During the Christmas holidays we are having three Divine Liturgies. One on

Tuesday Dec. 24th at 10 p.m. and two Christmas Day at 8:30 and 10:30 a.m.

Jesus is waiting for His gift, which is you, to come to wish the world peace and

harmony among mankind and charity in our hearts. Please, I ask you, to take

your religion seriously and to be a good disciple of Our Lord.

I take this opportunity to wish you all a Merry and Blessed Christmas and a

Happy Year filled with joy, kindness, and health.

Father Elias

PAGE 2 TULSA MARONITE NEWS VOLUME 17, ISSUE 9

1 Visitation of the Virgin to Elizabeth

8:30 Mass Jacobe and Anna

10:30 Mass for Sandra Fogley

2 Mass for Habib and Victoria Abi-Sarkis

3 No Mass

4 No Mass

4 Mass for the Sick and Dying

6 Mass for Peace in the World

7 No Mass

8 Birth of John the Baptist

8:30 Mass for Dominico and Anna

10:30 Mass for Louis Nasr

9 Mass for Toufic Abi-Sarkis

10 Mass for a special intention

11 Mass for Archbishop Francis Zayek

12 Mass for Naim Farah

13 Mass for Mariam AL-Adem

14 No Mass

15 Revelation to Joseph

8:30 Mass for Joseph Abi-Sarkis

10:30 Mass for the Sick and the Dying

16 Mass Marie Abi-Sarkis

17 Mass for Joseph Wakim

18 Mass for Elias Zayek

19 Mass for Milad Antonios

20 Mass for Therese Zaghrini

21 No Mass

22 Genealogy Sunday

8:30 Mass for Jacob & Juanita Jorishe

10:30 Mass for Chafic Nemer

23 Mass for the Youth

24 10 p.m. Christmas Eve Mass for Parishioners

25 Christmas Day

8:30 a.m. Mass for Unborn Babies

10:30 a.m. Mass for Peace in the World

26 Mass for the Sick and the Dying

27 Mass for the Faithful Departed

28 No Mass

29 Sunday after Christmas

8:30 Mass for Eugene & Karl Brugman

10:30 Mass for Vocations

30 Mass for all the Travelers

31 New Year’s Eve 7 p.m.

Mass for the Christian Families

Sunday December 15, 2013

At Saint Therese Church—Jorishie Hall

8315 S. 107th E. Ave., Tulsa (81rst St and Hwy 169)

Marinated Chicken, Kafta (beef patties), Hummus,

Salad, Hashwa (rice, ground beef, almonds),

Dessert & Beverage

To reserve your tickets

To order from the Bake Sale please call

Please make checks payable and mail to:

8315 S. 107th E. Ave., Tulsa OK 74133

Dec. 1 Women’s Club meeting after 10:30 Liturgy. Ro-

sary at 10 a.m.

Dec. 7 Decoration of church and hall at 10 A.M. Clean-

ing of the church after decoration. Volunteers needed to

help with the decoration.

Dec. 8 Men’s Club meeting in the Hall after 10:30 Lit-

urgy.

Dec. 13 & 27 Adult religious education at 7 p.m. in the

classroom.

No Meeting for the Board of Trustees in Decem-

ber. New members will be announced.

* THANK YOU for your gifts for the needy for

Thanksgiving.

* Every Sunday Catechism classes after 10.30 Mass.

Children must learn about Religion and especially

about the Maronite church.

Mass Intentions for December 2013 Dates to Remember

Sunday Contributions for November 2013

$5,017.00

Thank you for your generous act towards

your Church.

Sunday December 15, 2013

Lebanese Christmas Lunch

At Saint Therese Church—Jorishie Hall

11:30 am to 2:30 pm

8315 S. 107th E. Ave., Tulsa (81rst Street and Highway 169)

Marinated Chicken, Kafta (beef patties), Hummus, Salad, Hashwa (rice,

ground beef, almonds), Dessert & Beverage

Tickets

Adult — $ 15.00 Child under 10 — $ 10.00

To reserve your tickets OR

To order from the Bake Sale please call

Jackie Abraham @ (918) 627-0271 or

Ronald Fogley @ 918-260-2962

Please make checks payable and mail to:

St. Therese Maronite Catholic Church

8315 S. 107th E. Ave., Tulsa OK 74133

PAGE 4 TULSA MARONITES NEWS VOLUME 17, ISSUE 9

PAGE 4 TULSA MARONITE NEWS VOLUME 17, ISSUE 9

Reflections of the Meaning and Lesson of Christmas by Bishop Thomas G. Doran

For a long time now many people have written in this or a similar vein — that it is too bad that the Christmas sea-

son has become as much a celebration of exuberant consumerism as it is the celebration of the Incarnation. It

strikes many as odd that the coming of Christ as a poor and humble child should somehow become an occasion for

profligate consumption and, frequently, self-indulgence.

We wonder why it has come to this, and so we resolve that next year it will be different. But it will not be different

unless we, ourselves, become different. Instead, it is likely that out of habit and momentum we will be more caught

up than ever in the frenzy, until at last we mercifully reach the point we can no longer shop lest we drop. And so we

give it all up as a bad job. Then a time of great anticipation and joy becomes for us an occasion fraught with frustra-

tion and disappointment. Merry Christmas, indeed!

Actually, these feelings about trying to escape the consumer binge do credit to those who experience them. It is, to

be sure, important to keep in mind “the reason for the season.”

When we do that, we move closer not only to the meaning of Christmas but to the traditions regarding its celebra-

tion. Christmas giving goes back to a time when Christians gave one another small gifts in celebration and in imita-

tion of God’s great gift to us, which is the incarnation of Christ.

We do not like to think in theological terms in this age when we are so preoccupied with other questions, but God

could have made known His salvation in any way He chose. Think about it: He could have come bounding from the

heavens as a magnificent, awesome, kingly figure. Instead, He chose to be born of a humble couple in straitened

circumstances, far from home and out of money — and, indeed, out of luck because there was no room for them in

the travelers’ lodge. And so, as a result of mean circumstances to which he submitted, he was born in a stable. The

simplicity of that birth has given Christians ever since pause to realize that God chose to communicate the great

mystery of His love and mercy by sending us the least threatening divine presence we can imagine — a small child

totally dependent on his parents.

This was the beginning of a great problem for those who wanted a Wonder Counselor, Lord Mighty God, Father of

the World to Come, Prince of Peace, King of All. The Jews had longed for a Messiah who would be a prophet like

Moses, only greater. They longed for a savior who would lead his people to military and material victory over all

their enemies, subjugate those enemies, and give the chosen ones wealth and power in their world.

It is only with difficulty and over time that some of them eventually came to grips with the fact that Jesus, born in

the stable at Bethlehem, fulfills every prophesy made about the Messias in the Old Testament, and yet did so in a

way totally unexpected by the wise and the prudent of the generation to which he was born.

Today we glory in our knowledge (though not, it must be said, in our wisdom) and we are bedazzled by the myth

that knowledge is power. It is Christmas that can remind us, if we choose to be reminded, that power is borne of

weakness and strength of humility, and that the meek ultimately do and should inherit the earth.

So I say that in the midst of all our Christmas preparations we should take time to realize who is born on Christ-

mas Day. A sign of our subtle inversion of values is the practice that has grown up of celebrating Christmas for chil-

dren on Dec. 24. Instead of the first Mass for Christmas at midnight, we have the so-called Santa Claus Masses at 4

or 5 in the afternoon, so that the children do not have to be bothered with thinking about Jesus and his birth on

Christmas Day itself. This, of course, is a great convenience for parents and I sympathize with them in their ac-

ceptance of what basically is an anti-Christmas practice.

We should all realize that Christmas is a time when God in his humility shows us, if not who we are, at least what

we should strive to be.

In that spirit we should extend ourselves in yearlong gift-giving, not offering immense gifts and fabulous benisons,

but in providing little things that, one by one, make our neighbor’s lives holier, healthier and happier.